The need for safety systems for pitched roofs has long been recognized. For obvious reasons, it is important to secure roofing personnel while they are distantly located above the ground for the purpose of installing new roofs or for repairing existing roofs. Because serious bodily harm may be caused to a roofer should he or she fall from the roof of even a single story building, safety systems have been provided and are now required by government regulations under certain conditions. The stringency of the regulations is changing at all times, however, the thrust of the requirements are to maintain continuous securement between the roofer and a roofing safety system. With such systems in place, it is possible to prevent or break a roofer's fall should that roofer slip or for other reasons loose control while on the roof's surface. It is anticipated, that a roofer may be at risk of suffering injury anytime he is above the ground. For that reason, it is a highly desirable feature of roofing safety systems to provide securement means that may be utilized from the time the roofer leaves the ground in his ascension up to the roof, during his traversals there upon, and finally through his descent back to the ground from the roof.
Certain components of most roofing safety systems are standard, or at least known by most persons skilled in the art and involved in the roofing industry. Typically, an anchor means will be provided upon the roof and to which a roofer maybe connected. Examples of such anchors are shown in previous patents. An example of such an anchor is found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,361,558 to Thornton et al for a roof mountable safety line anchor. Therein, disclosure is found of an anchor that may be installed on a peaked roof. The anchor has an attachment means to which a safety line is connected for securement to the roof. As described therein, the safety line anchor of the Thornton patent is constructed from steel having a central point that may be bent to accommodate the peak of a roof. The legs of the anchor, however, remain substantially rigid with each of the two legs extending down from the roof's peak. A Roof Mounted Anchor Used Singly Or With Another, And With Other Equipment In a Fall Restraint and/or Fall Arrest System is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,944 to Woodyard. Therein, multiple anchors are shown that may be attached to a roof's peak and a cable extended therebetween. The anchors are configured to be attached to the roof's peak, however, and each is rigidly configured so that it accommodates only a specifically pitched roof. As a result, different anchors have to be used on differently pitched roofs because the configuration of the mountings of the Woodyard anchors are not variable. This prevents a single anchor from being used on inconsistently pitched roof peaks.
A common deficiency realized in currently available systems is an inability to secure the initial roofer who must install the anchoring components during original installation. That is, when the anchor is originally installed upon the roofs peak, the roofer has to initially ascend the roof unsecured. During that time, he or she is at risk of suffering an unprotected fall until connection of the anchor to the roof is achieved and the roofer is secured thereto. In any event, no systems are known that include means for protecting a roofer from the time he leaves the ground until he returns thereto. Nor has a system been discovered that permits access to any and all locations upon a given pitched roof.
Certain components of roofing safety systems have been previously disclosed and are known to those involved in the roofing industry. As an example, it is well known for a roofer to wear a body harness to which a safety line or rope may be attached. Typically, the distal end of that rope from the roofer has an attachment mechanism, often embodied in a latching hook, that may be attached to anchoring devices on the roof.
In summary, in view of known systems, several of which have been described herein above, the need for a roofing safety system to which a roofer may be continuously secured while off the ground has been recognized. Furthermore, it has been found that components of such a safety system may offer unique features and benefits that have not previously been achieved either at the component level, or in various combinations with each other.